Merry Xmas and a Happy New Year

We wanted to take this opportunity to wish all of our supporters and friends a merry Christmas and a very happy new year and to thank you for all you have done to help us this year.

The libraries and the bursary students continue to do very well. The libraries are busy and at this time of year are working with the students to help them write their annual reports on their progress.

It has been a tricky year in Kenya. We had to cancel our trip in May because of the difficulties in the coast region. We hope to be able to travel in February 2015. The communities we work with have been safe, but there have been reports of instabilities in the secondary school system and this has had an impact on our students. Several of them lost possessions in school fires and we have had to help them financially and several others have lost schooling time due to strikes and unrest. The librarians keep us informed and updated.

Following our decision last year to give the libraries delegated budgets, we have now introduced a new way of conducting financial reporting. This gives greater flexibility and responsibility to the librarians in Dabaso and Kakayuni. They have had to learn a new system based on Excel and we have been really pleased with the way they have approached learning this. Their reporting has delivered to our needs as well as the stringent demands of our Kenyan accountant.

We have had some good fundraising events this year – many of you will have attended some or all of them. The highly competitive Quiz night raised almost £2,000 and is definitely going to become part of the annual calendar. Everyone had such fun.

Our next event is a return of the very popular Blues Evening on Saturday 21 March 2015 in the Free Church Hall in Hampstead Garden Suburb. This will be a join event with the North London Hospice and more information and tickets details will be sent in the new year.